


Suited

by mcicioni



Category: The Magnificent Seven (1960)
Genre: Established Relationship, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-23
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:54:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26056795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcicioni/pseuds/mcicioni
Summary: Vin has a new position. And needs, well, suitable clothes.
Relationships: Chris Adams/Vin
Comments: 8
Kudos: 11





	Suited

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, all my thanks to darcyone, for all her clever suggestions, and to Sindarina and BethLange, for their unfailing support.

  
  


I look into what Chris and Mr Zuckerman refer to as a “cheval mirror”, and can barely recognise the middle-aged man in a dark blue worsted business suit. I glance longingly at the work shirt and levis that I have taken off for this “fitting” and narrow my eyes at the pale blue linen shirt and black string tie lying on the bench beside them.

“It will fit quite well, especially around your shoulders,” Mr Zuckerman says in his careful English, admiring his handiwork. Now I know what a horse, or a prize cow, feels on market days. “Please remember not to wear a gunbelt with it. And … it will look better if you can keep the waist slightly lower.”

I give him a resigned half-smirk. My forty-eight-year-old body has thickened some since we moved here ten years ago, and until last month I was happy enough to keep it covered with work clothes, socks with maybe one or two holes in them and scuffed boots. But about six months ago two men came to visit us. From the Board of Aldermen, whatever _that_ was. They told us that the town was growing and that of course it had law officers, but in order to function well it needed a town council to make bylaws, and a mayor and a deputy mayor to lead the council. They eventually got to the point. The deputy mayor had just resigned. So they needed to elect a new one.

“There must be at least three candidates,” they explained. “We already got Manuel Lopez and Ray Williams. We believe that a relative outsider, someone not embroiled in local politics, would be appropriate, and therefore we wonder if either one of you …”

At that point I suddenly remembered that the horses needed feeding and the vegetable garden at the back needed watering, and was out the door, ignoring the withering glance Chris gave me. I gave the aldermen enough time to say their piece and Chris enough time to say _No, thanks_ , and then I made my way back inside. Damn, the aldermen were still there, and both of them beamed at me.

“Mr Adams has explained that, unlike him, you have never served a jail sentence.” They smiled at Chris, obviously not holding his past against him in any way, and turned back to me. “That makes you a suitable candidate.” One of them pointed at three sheets of paper lying on the table and the other handed me a lead pencil. “Please sign here, and here, and here, Mr Staberg.”

“No,” I said. “No way. I ain’t what the town needs.” Some suitable candidate. Farm boy, drover, drifter, stagecoach guard, drifter, bounty hunter, drifter. Until the day I drifted into a border town and rode shotgun on a hearse.

“Can you wait until tomorrow?” Chris asked the aldermen. “I’ll try to talk him into it.” And all through the night, he flattered, cajoled and shouted, and then gave up talking and used more persuasive strategies, and in the morning, against my better judgement, I signed the blasted papers and became a candidate. My campaign was short. I took part in a meeting where I knew what I was talking about, on law and order, and in two meetings where I didn’t, on stud fees and permits for Mexican farm hands. Both the other candidates fitted the bill better than me: Williams had been a local for two generations, and Lopez had pull with the Mexican half of the residents. They were also family men, which I wasn’t. I relaxed, thinking that I could rest easy.

I thought wrong. 

And now I got to look the part.

  
  


Chris saunters into the shop and looks me over. “Very respectable,” he drawls. If I were wearing a gun, I’d consider using it. He steps closer and adjusts the collar of the linen shirt, then shakes his head at my tie, undoes the knot and reties it with the swift competence of someone who in his youth probably wore silk string ties every day at breakfast, dinner and supper. His fingers – still slender and strong, not a trace of old age in the joints – sketch the slightest of caresses on my neck, and I take a step back, because I’m looking foolish enough as it is, and the last thing I want is to grow visibly interested in front of Mr Zuckerman.

Zuckerman seems a nice enough fellow, but he’s got an evil streak. “You’ll need a new hat,” he says helpfully, throwing a sideways glance at my trusty grey Stetson. All right, it could be newer. And cleaner. Nobody’s business but my own. “Maybe a derby …?”

He reads my expression correctly and holds his peace. Wise man. I may get a new Stetson. One day.

“I will make the last few alterations now. You can collect your suit in maybe two hours.” He must be a bit older than Chris. His English is much better than my Pa’s was; I can’t figure out where he comes from. I shuck off the suit, slide back into my real clothes, and look at Chris.

“Want to go for a ride?”

He nods. We mount up and ride out of town, towards Box Canyon. We don’t talk, we just breathe in the October breeze and look at a bald eagle circling far above our heads. The Piedra Lumbre basin, covered with sagebrush and milkweed, is stretching out as far as our eyes can see. I ought to feel carefree. I don’t.

Chris glances at me, dismounts and sits on a boulder, gazing at the different colours of the cliffs. I follow him. At fifty-seven he’s still easy on the eyes, still lithe, graceful and dignified. His eyesight isn’t what it used to be, and he gets short of breath because he won’t give up those blasted cigars. But he’s my partner. In all possible ways. Even though, as time goes by, in some areas there’s a little less action than there used to be.

He gives me a long measuring look. His thoughts don’t seem to be moving in the same direction as mine.

“Let’s have it,” he says. 

“It ain’t just the clothes.” I scratch the back of my neck, where a mosquito just helped himself. “Remember when I went to a couple of council meetings, just to find out what all the fuss was about? One night they discussed how much it’d cost to put in new boardwalks and to hire a second schoolmarm. Another night they asked the Women’s Temperance lady to step out of the room and then discussed medical examinations for the girls at Minnie’s place. All good, sensible stuff, but I near nodded off once or twice. None of it …”

He cuts me off mid-tirade with a small downward slash of his hand.

“Our previous line of work,” he starts, slowly, unravelling his thoughts. “Exciting enough, I’ll give you that. But the best we could hope for, in the best possible circumstances …” He takes a deep breath, finds a cigar, holds it in his hands, stares at it. “… was to right one wrong. We wiped out Calvera’s band, we couldn’t wipe out the reasons why outlaws felt free to prey on farmers. Same with Lorca and his monument to his sons. The villages were rebuilt, but the big landowners still have all the power.”

He lights his cigar, takes a long puff. “And all the other times afterwards. Hell, it’s the general set-up that ought to be changed.” He looks at me, fond, disillusioned. “Not a job for hired guns.”

Of course it’s not. But what he said got me thinking. “Town councils … change small things," I reply. "One at a time. But eventually all the little changes add up. Paved roads. Schoolin for farmers’ kids, for Mexican kids. Minnie’s girls stay healthy and don’t infect their customers, so they don’t go around infectin anyone else. So …”

I stop talking and gawk at Chris. For fifteen years I’ve ridden with this man, fought beside him, fought with him, slept with him, and all the time I could’ve sworn that he could only see half-empty glasses. And now he’s just made me see that local politics, even in a two-horse town like ours, is a kind of half-full glass. 

That’s Chris. Always with an extra ace up his sleeve. And me, picking it up and playing it. He and I complement each other. We _suit_ each other. I grin at my own joke and stand up. “You made your point. Let’s go collect my new clothes.”

“I voted for you,” Mr Zuckerman says quietly, folding suit, shirt and tie and wrapping them up in soft paper before putting them into a cotton sack. “You strike me as someone who would …” he searches for the right word, finds it, “ … follow through with things. Who would speak for the little fellows against the banks and the big landowners.” He smiles at Chris. “If you had been a candidate, I would have voted for you, for the same reasons.” He gives us the sack and an itemised list, carefully written in black ink. “That will be forty-seven dollars fifty. Wear it in good health.”

Follow through. Yeah, I guess. If I manage to stay awake at the meetings, and not to kill anyone – with my bare hands, because I won’t be wearing a gunbelt. But what the hell, it’s only one meeting a month. 

Chris and I step out, mount up and head for home. I look at the road ahead, wondering whether “the general set-up” will change little by little, or whether there’ll be a big blow-up in twenty, thirty years’ time, when Chris and I aren’t going to be around to see it. 

Chris gives me a sideways look, with the little lopsided smile that never fails to make me go crazy, half with irritation and half with lust. “Quit daydreaming. You’ll never make it to President.”

I don’t rise to the bait. I nod placidly and keep riding. If things get difficult I’ll ask for his opinion. He’ll likely give it to me before I ask anyway. And we’ll likely discuss things late into the night. Maybe instead of the other action, maybe as well as. 

“I can live with that.”


End file.
